Red Sox: Will Bobby Valentine return to Fenway?

Thursday

Sep 27, 2012 at 6:00 AMSep 27, 2012 at 8:20 AM

Bill Ballou Red Sox

Walk through the halls of the State House down the road and up the hill from Fenway Park and you can see portraits of all the governors of the Commonwealth. There is one of John A. Volpe, 1965-69; one of Channing H. Cox, 1921-25; one of Levi Lincoln Jr., 1825-34; even one of Mitt Romney, 2003-07.

Etc.

It is like that in Bobby Valentine's Fenway office. Hanging on the wall behind his corner desk, literally looking over his right shoulder, are pictures of every Red Sox manager.

There is one of the first Sox manager, Jimmy Collins, 1901-06. There is one of Valentine's immediate predecessor, Terry Francona, 2004-11. There are photos of the good — Dick Williams, 1967-69; Joe Morgan, 1988-91 — and the bad: Billy Herman, 1964-66; Lou Boudreau, 1952-54.

And of the ugly, which is best left unsaid.

There is even a picture of George Huff in suitcoat and top hat, manager for eight games in 1907 before resigning to go back to his old job as baseball coach at the University of Illinois. And how times have changed, eh?

Considering how badly things have gone for Valentine and the Red Sox this season, the real possibility exists that yesterday was his final day in that office. The Sox' home schedule is done, and if Valentine is going to be fired, it will happen soon after the season ends — perhaps as soon as it ends — and he'll be joining Huff in the long line of ex-managers.

Valentine was asked before last night's game if he expects to be back and answered reasonably and cordially, unlike many people in that position, who would snarl at a suggestion that essentially they stunk at their job.

“I haven't thought about it,” he answered, going on to say that if it were his final day at Fenway, he wanted to thank some of the reporters who had been following his team throughout the long season.

While he and Sox management have talked about their team, they have not talked about Valentine's future.

“That makes me think that I'm coming back,” he said.

The issue is whether Valentine should be back. How much of this 2012 mess is his responsibility? How much was out of his control? What could he have done to make things turn out differently? Do the Red Sox need to make a clean break with him, as they did with Josh Beckett and Adrian Gonzalez?

It is impossible to determine that. Francona was “Francoma” in Philadelphia and will someday be a Red Sox Hall of Famer because of his work in Boston. Valentine finished last when he managed the Rangers, but later took the Mets to a World Series.

“I don't know what it is,” he said when asked how much of a factor the manager plays in a team's success or failure. “There are two schools of thought. It's either nothing or everything.”

Valentine's self-evaluation is not a favorable one. He doesn't think he did a good job.

“If you don't accomplish what you set out to do,” he said, “you haven't done a good job.”

Then, pausing, he added, “I wouldn't have done much differently, I don't think.”

Through the years, the Red Sox almost have always given their managers more than one season to prove themselves. The current ownership, though, has felt no obligation to do things the old way. It fired Joe Kerrigan after he managed for two months in 2001. It fired Grady Little after two years even though he got the team to within one inning of the American League pennant.

Then, it kept Francona for eight years, the second-longest tenure in franchise history.

That tenure had a messy ending, as most involuntary departures do. Some months after being let go, Francona looked back and reflected on the fact that what the Sox did when he was the manager worked wonderfully for 7-1/2 years, then fell apart for a half-year, coincidentally with the collapse of the pitching staff.

That collapse continued under Valentine this year. He has lasted longer than Kerrigan, but has a long way to go to catch Francona.

Whether or not he gets that chance should be known in about a week.

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